Donald Trump Takes Presidency With 276 Votes

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Nov. 8th marked the beginning to a new era of the United States of America’s history. After nearly two years of campaigning, the winner was decided and made the President of the United States of America.

The election began around 3PM and for almost eight hours Americans watched and waited to see who would get the 270 votes needed to win this years Presidential Race. People all over the country and the world watched their TVs, computers, and phones to see who won the majority of the electoral college.

For those who don’t know, the Electoral College is made up of a what is referred to as electors, every state has a set number of electors, totaling to 538 electors in total. Yes, 538, and yes that means that it is not the same amount of electors per state. Since the populations are so different in each state, they had to find a way to make sure it’s fair that places with more people have a larger voice.

To do so, they determine the amount of electors by the number of U.S. Senators plus the number of U.S. Representatives. Now every state gets two Senators, and each state has a different amount of Representatives, the total ends up being 435. That 435 is a set number by laws. Each state gets Representatives based on population as well. California having the most at 53, and some states at one like Alaska.

Finally to get to that 538, Washington D.C. gets the same amount of electors as the lowest number in a state. In clearer terms, since D.C. is not a state, it gets the same amount as the state with the least electors, so three.

Tuesday’s election showed the effects and the way the electoral college picked the president. Throughout the night Trump and Clinton were neck and neck to win the race. However as the night went on, Trump slowly gained the lead.

During those eight hours Trump or Hillary only leaded the other by a few votes, and it wasn’t until Florida gave its electors that their was a clear leader in the race. Florida was a swing state, meaning that it’s votes weren’t projected to go one way, unlike states like California which were predicted to be for Hillary. The votes were close, with each candidate only off by thousands of votes to take the state. In the end Trump won Florida 4,590,783 votes to 4,462,153. Florida being one of the largest states with electors, gave Trump a whole 29 votes gaining the lead.

As the election went on states were given to each candidate until it came to the final hours. Trump and Hillary were closing in to win, Trump had 244 votes, and Clinton had 215. The last large state was Pennsylvania with 20 electors to give, and like Florida was cutting it close to who would get the votes.

If Trump got the 20 votes, he would only be six short of winning the 270, and with four states projected to be a Trump state, Pennsylvania was the deciding factor on who won. Had Hillary gotten the 20 votes, it would’ve slowed Trump down, and given her a chance to win.

At last at around 10:47 PM the state had tallied their votes, and Trump had taken the electors. This was the state that gave him his winning lead to being the United States of America’s next leader.

Maine would then split their votes, and give Trump two more votes, meaning he only needed four to win. With states like Arizona, Wisconsin and Michigan having over four votes to their state, Trump was bound to win.

The night wasn’t over yet and hours were still to come of long waiting to have a winner announced. At last Wisconsin votes were counted, and Donald J. Trump was elected the new President of the U.S.A with 276 votes.

“I feel that America will be going through the process of much needed change and Trump and will make America great again” is how junior Mathew Giron feels about last night’s election.

Even though Trump has won the presidency, he did not win the popular vote. This means that out of everyone that voted this election, he got less votes. In fact Clinton had over 200,000 more votes than Trump.

The reason Trump won despite having less votes is because of the electoral college as mentioned before. He won the states that had more votes in the college than Hillary’s states; and because of this he was declared the winner.

Some people aren’t as thrilled about this though “Hillary won by popular vote, which means the people wanted Clinton not Trump.” is what Sydney Mamer, a junior at Palo Verde High School, thought about the results of the 2016 election, and how unfair it is.

After two years the election is over, and everyone has their own feelings and ideas of the events last night. It’ll be another four years till we either re elect Trump, or put someone new in office. For now welcome our 45th president of the United States of America, Donald J. Trump.